Z. Marcas | Page 7

in a
Seminary, but had refused to enter the priesthood. He felt in himself the
fires of immense ambition, and had come to Paris on foot at the age of
twenty, the possessor of two hundred francs. He had studied the law,
working in an attorney's office, where he had risen to be superior clerk.
He had taken his doctor's degree in law, had mastered the old and
modern codes, and could hold his own with the most famous pleaders.
He had studied the law of nations, and was familiar with European
treaties and international practice. He had studied men and things in
five capitals--London, Berlin, Vienna, Petersburg, and Constantinople.
No man was better informed than he as to the rules of the Chamber. For
five years he had been reporter of the debates for a daily paper. He
spoke extempore and admirably, and could go on for a long time in that
deep, appealing voice which had struck us to the soul. Indeed, he

proved by the narrative of his life that he was a great orator, a concise
orator, serious and yet full of piercing eloquence; he resembled Berryer
in his fervor and in the impetus which commands the sympathy of the
masses, and was like Thiers in refinement and skill; but he would have
been less diffuse, less in difficulties for a conclusion. He had intended
to rise rapidly to power without burdening himself first with the
doctrines necessary to begin with, for a man in opposition, but an
incubus later to the statesman.
Marcas had learned everything that a real statesman should know;
indeed, his amazement was considerable when he had occasion to
discern the utter ignorance of men who have risen to the administration
of public affairs in France. Though in him it was vocation that had led
to study, nature had been generous and bestowed all that cannot be
acquired--keen perceptions, self-command, a nimble wit, rapid
judgment, decisiveness, and, what is the genius of these men, fertility
in resource.
By the time when Marcas thought himself duly equipped, France was
torn by intestine divisions arising from the triumph of the House of
Orleans over the elder branch of the Bourbons.
The field of political warfare is evidently changed. Civil war henceforth
cannot last for long, and will not be fought out in the provinces. In
France such struggles will be of brief duration and at the seat of
government; and the battle will be the close of the moral contest which
will have been brought to an issue by superior minds. This state of
things will continue so long as France has her present singular form of
government, which has no analogy with that of any other country; for
there is no more resemblance between the English and the French
constitutions than between the two lands.
Thus Marcas' place was in the political press. Being poor and unable to
secure his election, he hoped to make a sudden appearance. He resolved
on making the greatest possible sacrifice for a man of superior intellect,
to work as a subordinate to some rich and ambitious deputy. Like a
second Bonaparte, he sought his Barras; the new Colbert hoped to find
a Mazarin. He did immense services, and he did them then and there;

he assumed no importance, he made no boast, he did not complain of
ingratitude. He did them in the hope that his patron would put him in a
position to be elected deputy; Marcas wished for nothing but a loan that
might enable him to purchase a house in Paris, the qualification
required by law. Richard III. asked for nothing but his horse.
In three years Marcas had made his man--one of the fifty supposed
great statesmen who are the battledores with which two cunning
players toss the ministerial portfolios exactly as the man behind the
puppet-show hits Punch against the constable in his street theatre, and
counts on always getting paid. This man existed only by Marcas, but he
had just brains enough to appreciate the value of his "ghost" and to
know that Marcas, if he ever came to the front, would remain there,
would be indispensable, while he himself would be translated to the
polar zone of Luxembourg. So he determined to put insurmountable
obstacles in the way of his Mentor's advancement, and hid his purpose
under the semblance of the utmost sincerity. Like all mean men, he
could dissimulate to perfection, and he soon made progress in the ways
of ingratitude, for he felt that he must kill Marcas, not to be killed by
him. These two men, apparently so united, hated each other as soon as
one had deceived the other.
The politician was made one of a ministry; Marcas remained in the
opposition to hinder his man from being